russia and racsim

Yes, you certainly can't he aligned himself with Hitler got his fingers burnt and switched sides. I've never understood the intellectual double standard between Stalin, Mao on the one hand and Hitler.

Blacks stand out more in snow.
But yeah it isnt that bad if you say in Moscow and Petersburg, when i went we didnt have any issues, except one guy had a "random" search at the airport and you do get funny looks.

Whether he switched sides or not, involvement of Soviet Union helped Allies to win the war. What strikes me is the double standards of people who are happy to criticise Stalin, but deny whatever effort his forces put to stop Fascism. Yes, he did switch sides, but the question is not about his decisions, the question is about their consequences, and at the time Churchill and Roosevelt were only too happy to ally with him, because of the sheer army force he provided.

It always astounded me that there would be Russian Neo Nazis, an Ideology and a state that killed 20 Million of their countrymen

Stalin was an absolute monster full stop. Only an feckless imbecile would deny how bravely the Soviet troops fought, the letters Soviet fighters sent to their beloveds are some of the finest pieces of war/love literature ever put to paper.
They deserve credit despite Stalin, not because of him and his corrupt regime; executing their top military brass cost far more Russian casualties then need have been.

Because it's a polite way of telling Bismarck to provide sources

A big reason why "some" russians may be racist is because alot of people from neighbouring countries do literally take a huge number of jobs.

Last time I was in Russia, I drove past a mass, maybe about 700 non russians looking for cheap work, they would work for pennies.
There were alot of these masses across Moscow, so you can imagine that a standard rate russian builder is not going to get business when for 3 bottles of vodka you can get your garage roof done.


PS. He did a wonderful job on the garage

I see he gets questions politely framed. Clearly double standards are a play here. Theres a great book called "Jews & Jewish Life in Russia & the Soviet Union", also worth reading the first few chapters of the biography of Sergey Brin "the story of Sergey Brin" where he recounts being Jewish in the USSR, it's confirmed by the stories of other Jews and Turkic migrants from Russia.


Having two warnings on average a week would seem reason enough.


Kudos for slipping yet another back handed compliment into your post. Well played.

A single book? Is that all you can muster? Can't you fathom the awesome power of, ironically, Sergey Brin's creation to find me something else to prove your seemingly outlandish claims?

Yes, whatever you want to imagine

That would be two books, which would offer you references to other sources.

And I was only pulling your leg about the mods. I detect a sense of humor failure.

Hardly; even Khruschev was a Ukrainian (i think) and even Stalin was a Georgian. The USSR had huge numbers of Tartars (muslims i guess) in its army and police force and Russia still does. The institution itself forced equality, total blind illogical equality, down the throat of its populations; it is ridiculous to suggest that the same institution could be institutionally racist.

There you go, my point exactly. He might have been a monster, but denying Soviet Union its credit, is to deny those troops credit. If you look at my original post, it was Soviet Union I was talking about.

As to the earlier talk about racism, it was not racism that was prevalent in Stalin's regime, it was religious intolerance, which is often linked to racism, but not in this case- a friend of my grandads was questioned over crossing himself, despite being Russian.

After Stalin (and before Stalin), every Soviet leader was a Slav, despite Slavs making up half of the USSR's population. In every Soviet Republic, the "first secretary", i.e. the person who made sure the head of the Republic didn't deviate from Soviet policy, was an ethnic Russian. A vast majority of the Politburo, and most of the top generals were Slavs. Every nation in the USSR had to speak Russian, and adopt Russian customs. Take it from someone who lived in the place, the USSR was a very, very racist place.



http://books.google.com/books?id=bJBH5pxzSyMC&dq=jews+and+jewish+life+in+russia+and+the+soviet+union&printsec=frontcover&source=bn&hl=en&ei=EzKcStyFNZrnnQeOlZGWCA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4#v=onepage&q=&f=false
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/46574/zvi-gitelman/glasnost-perestroika-and-antisemitism
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,875826,00.html
http://www.aps.org/policy/statements/91_3.cfm

Well, is that racism or cultural chauvinism? Because the same argument could be used for the French or Americans Whether or not they were culturally chauvinistic, did they look down on a brown person or a black person simply because they were brown or black?

I mistook your earlier point for which I apologize, but there is no may have been a monster, anymore than Einstein may have been slightly cleaver.

I can acknowledge the sacrifices and bravery of the Soviet people whilst still withholding the same for the vast majority of Soviet leadership, the two are not synonymous.

Religious intolerance was part of it, but strains of ethnic intolerance ran throughout the life of the USSR, and sat uneasy with it's official ideals. I am not for one moment comparing the USSR with fascism in degrees, merely pointing out that under Stalin innumerable deaths occurred based on ethnicity, not just religion. And later settled into a quiet state racism, which has gotten worse since the break up.

Well, is that racism or cultural chauvinism? Because the same argument could be used for the French or Americans Whether or not they were culturally chauvinistic, did they look down on a brown person or a black person simply because they were brown or black?

I agree that Stalin was a monster, far be it from me to defend a dictator like him, but many people judge a country by its ruler, which isn't entirely fair.

I agree that Stalin was a monster, far be it from me to defend a dictator like him, but many people judge a country by its ruler, which isn't entirely fair.

I agree, I don't approve of this anti-Russian hysteria thats been going around of late, i.e assumptions were reached about the Georgian conflict before the facts proved otherwise. To some extent I see Russias point in its dispute with the Ukraine. If anything we seem to be pushing Russia further away, by the tone we set.